Environmental Protection
Debate between Mark Francois and Jim McMahon(1 year, 4 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Jim McMahon
Nuance and facts do matter in this type of debate, but the facts speak for themselves, frankly: going by the Government’s figures, there are 800 such discharges each and every day. As we see right across the country, including in my own region, beaches are completely closed off to members of the public, and that has a material impact on the businesses who rely in good faith on tourists coming. That is the lived experience of people there, and we should not decry that either, so let us get the balance right and accept that this issue needs to be addressed.
A responsible Government would undertake an economic impact assessment to truly understand the impact of the problem, but the order itself states that an economic
“impact assessment has not been produced for this instrument as no, or no significant, impact on the private, voluntary or public sectors is foreseen.”
That feels to me as if the Government have their head in the sand.
Mr Francois
As the hon. Gentleman will know, there is a great deal of debate at the moment not just about the Government’s spending plans but about those of His Majesty’s official Opposition. Everyone knows that preventing any discharges of any kind would involve the investment of hundreds of billions of pounds. As the Secretary of State has already made plain, the Government are committed to spending billions as it is. If Labour thinks that we are not doing enough, how much more money would it spend on this that we are not already committed to? Give us a number.
Jim McMahon
I will check the voting record later, but we presented our plan to Parliament, and Members had the choice to vote for or against it. That plan would have seen sewage discharges ended by 2030. We believe, and the evidence says, that that could be done with the money that is currently being derived from dividends. That is how it would be funded, and that would mean bill payers were protected. I am disappointed that the Government did not support that, but we are where we are.